Family farm makes life 'peachy' for Boys and Girls Club
| Thursday, Jun 17 2010 06:00 PM
Last Updated Thursday, Jun 17 2010 06:00 PM
SPEAKING OF THE BOYS AND GIRLS CLUB...
Boys and Girls Clubs of Kern County is the recent recipient of two charitable donations, one from a large corporation and the other from a local religious group.
A grant from Edison International will support club functions for children at the Frazier Mountain location in Frazier Park
A gift of about $5,000 from Champions in Christ -- the motorcycle ministry of Harvest Christian Church in northwest Bakersfield -- will fund a new sound system and mobile room dividers for the club's Young Street site in southwest Bakersfield.
Both organizations will present checks at Kern County centers Friday.
Images
Vickie Murray with Murray Family Farms shows children at the Boys and Girls Club of Bakersfield how to prepare the pit of a cherry, to be used in a seed-spitting contest, by eating the fruit around it. Murray Family Farms donated the fruit for the children to help educate them about eating fresh fruit.
Anthony Lopez gets a bit excited after a successful spit in the cherry seed-spitting contest at the Boys and Girls Club of Bakersfield. Murray Family Farms donated fruit for the event to help teach children at the club about eating fresh fruit.
Vickie Murray, right, with Murray Family Farms invites Sheray Johnson, second from left, to take fruit from every basket on the table at the Boys and Girls Club.
On almost any other day, Edson Portillo would have been reprimanded for spitting cherry seeds.
Not on Thursday at the Boys and Girls Club in east Bakersfield, where he and scores of other children enjoyed a fruit-filled morning run by Murray Family Farms.
Portillo, an incoming fifth grader at Mount Vernon Elementary School, was crowned seed-spitting champion after three rounds of competition, earning his title by landing a pit in a bucket eight feet away.
"It was awesome," Portillo said, smiling widely.
It was also educational. After the youngsters entered the gymnasium -- one opened his mouth and licked his lips as he walked by the bins of fresh fruit -- Murray Family Farms co-owner Vickie Murray demonstrated to them the benefits of selling produce directly to consumers.
There were other lessons to be learned, too. Boys and Girls Club program director Chris Molina said many of the children don't have access to fruits and vegetables when they're at home, so events like these impart the concept that eating healthy food can be fun.
"It really opens the eyes of the kids," he said. "It gives them the idea that, 'I know there are seeds inside this fruit, but I need to eat this fruit first to get to the seeds.' It's all how you introduce it."
Murray was inspired by her upbringing in inner-city Detroit -- and her ever-apparent love for farming -- to organize outreach programs across Kern County. Thursday's event was the second of five such engagements this summer. And there might be more in the future.
"Some of these kids, they didn't know what a nectarine is, what an apricot is," Murray said as children filled white paper bags with five unique fruits. "It makes me cry."
Murray Family Farms, which was established more than 20 years ago, has two locations in the area and offers school tours and hay wagon rides in addition to nearly 180 varieties of fresh-picked fruit.
Murray said she decided to coordinate the off-site activities because many schools and nonprofit organizations cannot afford field trips, and her latest visit sure seemed like a success.
"It was really good," Boys and Girls Club staffer Nathalie Martinez said. "The kids learned a lot, I think. They were really into it, really involved."
The Boys and Girls Club on Niles Street in east Bakersfield originated in a nearby church in 1966 and moved to its current site, which features a gymnasium, computer lab, library and several multipurpose rooms, in the 1990s.
During the summer, it functions much like a day camp. Children ages 5 through 17 can access the club for $125 a week, and scholarships are available for low-income families.
Activities like ping pong tournaments and jump rope contests are meant to keep the participants active and happy. Or, in the case of Thursday's program, healthy and happy.
"Hopefully, now the kids have a different vision," Molina said. "When they go to the grocery store, they're gonna tell their mom or dad, 'I saw these when Murray Farms came out. These are peaches. Can I have one? I tasted one, and it was good!'
"They'll want to eat fruit because of what they did today. They want to get to that seed."
